Learn

Master

Course Description

The 8 Factors is a focused, easy-to-follow business management framework containing real-world solutions to small business problems.

The 8 Factors course distills the best content from business books, MBA theory, and the personal experience of over 400 successful Entrepreneurs into a practical and powerfully simple approach.

The course is most suited for the self employed solo-preneur or established small business owner looking for an uncensored approach to improving their business, while they run it.

Because we’re fully aware that two of the biggest challenges small business owners face when growing a business is "clarity & cash,” we’ve kept each video simple, direct, truthful, and concentrated on what actually works.

Whether you’re starting a business or trying to grow several, there’s a factor impacting your ability to succeed right now.

These focused video lessons, step-by-step downloadable worksheets, assessments and tools, will support you in increasing business and creating a growth plan specific to your small business. Your business, and your ability to lead it, will improve immediately!

In this course you will discover exactly how to:

Learn how to start, better manage, and grow your business

Go from “Cash Poor” to “Cash Rich”

Get “Strategy” right the first time

Attract a great team, lead and develop your people.

Develop a company culture that drives personal & professional impact

Improve efficiency and Get Rid of Waste

Optimize Your Business & Team Structure

Elevate Your Leadership

C'mon and give yourself a "kick in the business" that you can take all the way to the bank.

Testimonials from real business owners:

"When I first took the 8 Factors class 2 years ago, we had only about 5 employees and contractors. Today we have almost 20 people, and at the same time, our revenues have grown by 300 percent thanks to the 8 Factors framework."

-Nona Lim, Cook! SF

"We almost sold our brand to a big chain until we used the 8 Factors Course to remind us that our mission—to provide unique, healthy products like Artisan Nut Butters and to grow jobs— is stronger than our need to sell out. We're on target for $8 million in sales!"

-Santi Cuenca-Romero, Premier Organics

"We've grown from 35 to 78 employees in one year thanks to the 8 Factors Course. This year, we're tackling an unforeseen financial challenge by planning for best and worst case scenarios. But 8 Factors is helping us turn negative circumstances into positive opportunities."

-Tanya Scott, Ed Support Services

“The 8 Factors is powerfully simple and powerfully practical. It’s hard to argue with 8 million dollars in sales.”

-Rolando Brown, Made To Grow

What are the requirements?

The blood, sweat and tears it takes to be a successful entrepreneur.

What am I going to get from this course?

Over 28 lectures and 10.5 hours of content!

Learn how to start, better manage, and grow your business.

The 8 Factors is Effective... It distills the white noise of business books, MBA theory and management rhetoric into a powerfully simple and practical program that delivers proven results.

The 8 Factors is Actionable... It provides entrepreneurs with a simple, repeatable, easy to understand business management methodology that can be put in practice today.

The 8 Factors is Personal... It facilitates the development of a growth plan based on what is happening in your business at that moment – at your preferred pace, time, and level of interactivity.

What is the target audience?

Whether you are starting a business or trying to grow a business, The 8 Factors Business Framework is the most powerful business management tool available for today's entrepreneurs and small business owners.

Like many small business people, this is the lesson you’re most interested in. It might also be the one you’re most afraid of. Maybe you’re afraid to find out you make good cupcakes or cappuccinos but you’re not making any money doing it. You’re not alone. You might be afraid of numbers or think you‘re just not good at math. I’m going to help you get over those emotions because understanding your financial picture is so important to the success of your business.

As we detailed in the last lesson, the income statement helps you plan, keep your business on track and know how to respond to changes in the business by providing an estimation of profit — the measurement of business performance that gets a great deal of people’s focus and attention. What it doesn’t tell you, and what most people don’t talk about, is what is happening with cash.

Quiz 2

Cash - Cash Management With High or Low Profitability

8 questions

Section 3:
Strategy - Let's Do It Right Now, You Don't Need An MBA To Do It

In your work with Factor 1, you clarified your vision, mission and values. You know where you’re heading and clear on your destination, but you need to figure out how you should best get there; taking into account the vehicle you’re traveling in, current and expected weather, road construction, conditions and traffic. The complicated work of trying to figure out how best to get from where you are to where you want to be is the complex work of strategy.

Now, we dig deeper and explore the reasons that you always feel pressure in running your business, sometimes seemingly from all directions. There are many things that impact your business strategy including a number of outside forces that exert pressure on you and your business. The better you are able to identify the source of the force and assess the strength of each of the forces, the more strategic you will become in your decision- making.

With a strategic foundation established through the work on operating discipline and the forces that affect your business, we now turn our attention to identifying the path to opportunity which, as it turns out, is oftentimes right in front of you.

If you are someone who isn’t comfortable dealing with the “people issues,” as an entrepreneur, you have no choice. You need to get comfortable being uncomfortable and focus first on getting better at hiring. Of everything we have talked about in this lesson it is the one process that will have the most significant impact on your business.

Culture’s job is to attract and keep the right people. You as the leader must realize then that people inside and outside the company are constantly evaluating whether the company is what it says it is.

Begin to assess the culture today. Determine some of the attitudes, values or behaviors that you may need to work to change and gain some insight into the degree to which your perception matches reality regarding your culture.

Processes describe how you do everything in your business from building products, hiring staff and paying suppliers to delivering a service to customers. Whether or not you have taken the time to document it, there is always a series of steps that get completed as part of everything in your business. You want to be sure you are taking the right steps to perform the work but you also want to be certain that you are doing it in a way that supports and is aligned with the other Factors.

Your organizational structure should enable people to work effectively in a manner that is consistent with the other Factors and be dictated by how the business needs to function to best serve the customer.

The next step in your development as a leader is improving your ability to turn your focus inward and honestly assess your leadership strengths and weaknesses, how you are performing as a leader today and what you need to do to get better as a leader tomorrow.

Instructor Biography

Michael has helped hundreds of Entrepreneurs make millions of dollars.

Michael developed The 8 Factors Business Framework while struggling with the rapid growth of his own company. Fighting fires and running from one crisis to the other was the norm, until he started looking at the roots of his problems and discovered that he could put them into 8 categories that he now refers to as The 8 Factors: Mission, Cash, Strategy, People, Culture, Processes, Structure, Leadership. Understanding the interconnected nature of these factors and how a change in one impacted the others, Michael used this business framework to grow his business into the world's largest telecommunications infrastructure development provider which was eventually acquired, publicly traded, and Michael was named CEO of Tetra Tech Communications Group.

As a prolific entrepreneur, turnaround consultant, business advisor and educator, Michael C. Bush has more than 30 years of experience and has helped thousands of entrepreneurs learn how to increase business. Michael's paradigm-shifting approach to business, distills the best content from business books, MBA theory, and personal insight into a powerfully simple and practical business framework for people who are currently running or just starting a small business: The 8 Factors.

A champion of small businesses and job creation, Michael offers refreshingly honest straight-talk with the compassionate tone of someone who has been there. A charismatic speaker, Michael draws on lessons from his childhood, to offer personal accounts that are revealing, humorous, and insightful. Through his entertaining, honest, and inspiring style, Michael forges immediate and lasting connections with audiences.

Michael received his M.S. in Management from The Graduate School of Business at Stanford University. In addition to his management consulting work, he sits on the board of Inner City Advisors and teaches entrepreneurship courses at a number of institutions including: Stanford University and Mills College. Michael is also a member of President Obama's White House Business Council, a group of business advisors that meets at the White House to help shape policy on issues that impact small businesses and promote economic prosperity and job creation in urban areas.

Excellent framework that I can use for years to come!

Before I started this course, I had registered my consulting business, and I even had my first client. But I struggled to define my offerings and develop a plan. Michael's course gave me a framework for how to build my business and constantly answer the question, "What do I do now?" His teachings are accessible and can be applied to any type or stage of business. Part of the tremendous value of this course is that it will help me as much in my firm's tenth year as it has in its first. Thank you Michael Bush!

Compelling content and necessary for any entrepreneur!

I had the pleasure of just wrapping up this course at the HUB with Michael so combining the online tools on Udemy with in person lectures and office hours has been such a benefit to our business already. After doing my undergrad in Intl Business I can safely say Michael is the best professor I've ever had in a business curriculum. Period. Knowledgeable, funny and real.
My biggest take-away: Clarifying mission, vision and values is critical to the success of any business- whether it is a socially-based venture or not! Highly recommended.

Exactly What I Wanted.

My goal in choosing this course was to get a firm understanding of the path to sustainable success as a small business. What does it really take? And what more can I do with my current situation? Michael C. Bush's 8 Factors was a ground-level look into my day-to-day operations, while polishing and inspiring my meta-vision, my "why", and my impact. I wasn't aware of HOW I was limiting myself until I asked the RIGHT questions. The class was a safe container to get properly lost, and then found, with a masterful guide. Michael's experience shines through with examples and real-life applicable advice.
You have several options when choosing a business course, with strategies and cookie-cutter systems, and teachers who lead with bells and whistles. This course is for entrepreneurs who are willing to work hard, be financially rewarded, and still maintain the reigns on personal values. Chose this course to get a firm grasp of what it truly takes, from planning, budgeting, timing, funding, hiring & firing, managing, modeling, and testing... this is a complete jumpstart for a new venture, OR a review/revamp for a business that you know has more potential... perhaps you may not know your next moves. Start here.
I'm sure the other reviews are glowing. Michael delivers.

This is a serious, tremendously worthwhile course

Highly substantive content, outstanding presentation (Michael is engaging and fun), and the materials provided are designed as working documents to help you turn concepts into action plans tailored to your business. This is as good as online education gets.